Howard Fineman is Newsweek’s chief political correspondent, senior editor and deputy Washington bureau chief. Nationally known as a writer and commentator on politics, Fineman is also an NBC News analyst, contributing reports to shows on NBC, MSNBC and CNBC. His work has also been published in The New Republic and The Washington Post.
Named one of the country’s foremost political reporters by Washingtonian magazine, Fineman has covered Congress and national elections for Newsweek since 1980. He has been chief political correspondent since 1984 and was named a senior editor in 1995. He has interviewed and covered every president since Jimmy Carter, and written more than a score of cover stories for Newsweek, including nine in the 1996 election year. Over the years his covers have included: the rise of the religious right, the power of talk radio, race and politics, the Clinton campaigns and scandals, the impact of digital technology on society, and the candidacies of Gary Hart, Pat Buchanan, Jesse Jackson, Ross Perot, Steve Forbes and Bob Dole.
As Newsweek’s lead political reporter, Fineman has appeared on most major news and public affairs shows, including “Nightline,” “Face the Nation,” “Larry King Live,” “Fox News Sunday,” “Charlie Rose” and “NewsHour.” Fineman was a regular panelist on PBS’s “Washington Week in Review” from 1983 to 1995, and on CNN’s “Capital Gang Sunday” from 1995 to 1998. He has helped report and produce two “Nightline” specials.
The Forbes Media Guide has called Fineman a “standout in the press corps.” He has won or shared in numerous journalism awards, including National Magazine Awards to Newsweek in 1982 and 1992. His work was instrumental in the magazine’s winning the American Journalism Review’s “Best in the Business” awards in 1988 and 1992 for presidential campaign coverage, and in 1994 for coverage of the Clinton administration’s first term.
A native of Pittsburgh, Fineman began his journalism career in 1973 at The Louisville Courier-Journal, covering the environment, the coal industry and Kentucky politics before joining the newspaper’s Washington bureau in 1978. He joined Newsweek in Washington in 1980.
Fineman holds an A.B., phi beta kappa, from Colgate, an M.S. in journalism from Columbia, and a J.D. from the University of Louisville. His legal education included a year at the Georgetown University Law Center. He received Watson and Pulitzer Traveling Fellowships for study in Europe, Russia and the Middle East. He lives in Washington with his wife, Amy L. Nathan, an attorney, and their two children, Meredith and Nicholas.
